It's good to be the best coach in college game

Mike BianchiOrlando Sentinel

Published Tuesday, January 04, 2005

MIAMI -- I just couldn't resist.

The best coach in college football was standing there Sunday at Orange Bowl Media Day being barraged by questions about playing USC for the national championship. That's when I walked up and said with a straight face:

"Coach, I don't know if you've heard, but Urban Meyer announced today he's decided to stay at Utah. Your name is being mentioned as the top candidate at the University of Florida. Can you comment?"

Bob Stoops did a brief double take, shook his head, realized he was being set up, then busted out laughing.

"I'm not putting out any more statements," he said with a smile splashed across his face.

He doesn't have to--at least for another few years. At last count before Florida finally hired Meyer, Stoops issued three statements saying he wasn't leaving Oklahoma. It's no wonder Meyer credited Stoops with being one of the key people who convinced him to accept the UF job. Stoops probably was thinking: "If I can get him to take the job, maybe the Gators will finally leave me alone."

Actually, Stoops never would think such a thing about a Florida program that transformed him from a co-defensive coordinator at Kansas State (with Jim Leavitt) into the hottest coaching property in all of college football. The fact is, Florida Athletic Director Jeremy Foley has made Stoops a very rich man.

Not many people remember that it was Foley who urged former UF coach Steve Spurrier to hire Stoops as defensive coordinator after the 1995 season in which K-State led the nation in defense. Not only that, but Foley's flirtations have spurred Oklahoma into giving Stoops at least one major raise and contract extension--maybe two. It seems every time Foley so much as makes a phone call to Stoops, Oklahoma throws another million bucks at him.

Foley never has been able to hire Stoops, but Stoops did help Foley hire Meyer, who sought out Stoops' advice when scoping out the UF job.

"Coach Stoops told me the Florida job is the only job in the country he would want besides the one he already has," Meyer said.

There are many UF insiders who believe Stoops was tempted to take the UF job himself a few weeks ago, and at least one prominent booster said UF had put together a $3.5 million-a-year war chest to lure Stoops back to Gainesville.

Fact or fiction--who knows?

In coaching searches, there is so much information and misinformation that it's difficult to determine truth.

Sometimes, when Stoops turns on the TV, he can't believe some of the reports he hears about himself.

It's like the old Jimmy Buffett lyric "Ain't it quite funny how word gets around? I heard I was in town."

"I marvel at some of the things I hear," Stoops said. "It's crazy. Sometimes, I'm asked to make a statement about a job that I don't even know I'm a candidate for."

Oh, well.

There are worse things than being the object of every AD's desire.

When you ooze charisma, when you're 67-6 in six seasons, when you're about to play in your third national-championship game, you learn to live with the constant speculation.

Stoops gets so many job offers that he even chides the media when they miss one.

"I got another one last week," Stoops told a bunch of writers Sunday.

"How come you guys didn't report on that one?"

About this time, a writer from the New York Post walks up and says with a straight face: "Coach, can you address the rumor that you may be going to the Yankees?"